It’s almost Christmas time and as you prepare for the holiday shopping spree and start feeling the giving spirit of the holidays, it might be a good idea to help crowd-fund some cool projects and offer a contribution for gadget enthusiasts like yourself who have original ideas and want to turn them into real products.

In the following post, I will take a look at the most original projects that you can pledge for, then list others that are also worth looking at. Read on to discover them all, and keep in mind that, as with any crowd-funded project, you have to exercise your better judgement and no outcome is really guaranteed.

One form of media that has definitely stood the test of time is the comic book. Since 1933, when the first comic book was published, the industry has grown from strength to strength and led to blockbuster creations such as the Avengers and Batman. And the main reason people still read comics is that they provide both visual and textual gratification to the reader. Thanks to our mobile devices getting larger screens and the ubiquity of tablets, comics are no longer limited to physical books but can also be enjoyed on our Android devices.

There is now a growing number of apps that allow you to devour comics and mangas on your mobile device, and in this article I will show you my personal favorites and help you find a few other high quality ones.

A couple of months ago, I put the top four note-taking apps on Android to test in an attempt to figure out what each one was good at. If there’s one other thing I use my phone most for – barring the usual calling & texting, of course – it is to manage my todo lists. So this time around, I take the top task management apps on Android and put them through the paces to try and identify a winner.

Now I’m not new to this game, really. For years, I’ve pounced upon every app that had anything to do with task management, GTD and the likes. Having gone from using Remember The milk to Astrid to Wunderlist, back to Remember the Milk & Todoist, I keep going through the phases every time the landscape seems to change a bit. Consider this that phase, and join me as I go through each app and review it on three parameters – core features, user interface and other bells and whistles.

Google’s Play Game Services were heralded as a big level up for Android gaming when they were announced back in May. Finally we had a universal system and an easy-to-implement API for tracking achievements and leaderboards across games, carrying saved games across devices (cloud save), and enjoying real-time multiplayer with friends — even on iOS, if the App Store version also integrates Play Game Services. And it’s all accessible through an app, just like Game Center on iOS.

But you can’t just pull up a filter on the Play Store to uncover Play Game Services-supported apps, and finding them can at times feel like wielding arcane arts. So Android.AppStorm’s editorial boss lady [Ed note: that would be me – Rita] asked me to round up a big list of the best. Here are more than 40 games that use at least one of the new services. I’ve included a note on each one to say which Play game services it utilizes, for your convenience.

Google Cloud Print is the cool beta service we all know and love for over-the-air printing. We’ve come to accept it as part of our day-to-day printing lives on our desktops but what about our Android phones and tablets? When do they get a turn?

In this roundup, we’re going to take a look at some of the Google Cloud Print-compatible apps available for Android so you can get printing literally wherever in the world you are. If you haven’t got Google Cloud Print setup or are left wondering what it actually does, be sure to check out Getting Started with Google Cloud Print on Tuts+.

Fall is here and we’re starting the countdown of the year’s last quarter towards 2014. As time flies by, it brings with it more interesting crowd-funded projects from Indiegogo and Kickstarter.

In the following post, I will take a look at the most original projects that you can pledge for, then list others that are also worth looking at. Read on to discover them all, and keep in mind that, as with any crowd-funded project, you have to exercise your better judgement and no outcome is really guaranteed.

I’ve been an Android user for a few years now – and a devout one at that. You know those people who are the anti-apple-fanboys, the ones who proudly refuse to buy Apple products, who gloat at every opportunity to criticize the iconic company and its fanboys? Yeah, that was me. Actually, I’m still not a big fan of Apple, but things have been different since I had to get my first iDevice – an iPod Touch – simply to be able to preview and test the apps we design for iOS at work.

Having lived extensively in a two-devices-in-my-pocket-at-all-times world, I’ve come to see reason in my arguments – both for and against Android & iOS. There are multi-platform apps that I happily use on both, my Android phone and the iPod touch. And there are those that I’ve come to love on Android, but just haven’t found replacements on iOS as yet. What follow is just that – apps I can’t live without on Android, and miss sorely on iOS.

When was the last time you forgot your phone at home and spent the whole day thinking about all the text messages and missed calls you got while you were away? How about that evening when your workout drained your energy away and made you too lazy to stand up, walk all the way to your phone just to reply to that text you just received — Oops, it was just your bank promoting their newest credit card!

We have the right apps for these occurrences: the ones that let you read your text messages straight from your computer, wherever you — and your phone — are. Even better, you’ll be able to reply to messages, send new ones and even check your missed calls from your PC or tablet. Some apps offer even more advanced features, so it’s worth checking them out to find the perfect one for you!(more…)

You’ve probably come across this problem many times. You want to play the hot new mobile game that you just discovered with your friend, but he or she has an iPhone. What do you do? If you’re lucky, you both pick up a copy of the game and it works — you can connect and play together. But more often than not, you wind up disappointed. It might be available for both platforms, but for some reason you just can’t cross streams.

So you vow to keep an eye out for some great games — new or old — that will let you play with your iOS-loving friends. We shouldn’t have to deal with iOS and Android segregation in this day and age, where solutions for implementing cross-platform multiplayer are plentiful. Here are nearly 40 games that set the example and do it right.(more…)

It’s a new month, the back-to-school time for many students of all ages, and another exciting time for Android enthusiasts. Over the past few weeks, several interesting crowd-funded projects have popped up on Indiegogo and Kickstarter and it’s time we took a look at the most interesting ones that you can pledge for.

As with last month, we will pick the most exciting ideas first, then a list of other ones that are worth looking at. Read on to discover them all, and keep in mind that, as with any crowd-funded project, you have to exercise your better judgement and no outcome is really guaranteed.